Dental hygiene
is a hands-on career that is both rewarding and challenging. Dental hygienists
provide patients within their communities with comprehensive dental hygiene
care that includes oral health education, oral health prevention procedures and
various complex dental hygiene treatment procedures to treat a variety of
periodontal diseases. There are many things a student can do to prepare when
applying to dental hygiene schools.
Professor and
dental hygienist Katie Williams, RDH, M.S., of the University of South Dakota
shares advice to help guide predental hygiene students.
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Acquiring opportunities to shadow a dentist still seems to be a
popular subject of little knowledge among dental students, although it is
considered the most valuable experience for aspiring dentists during their high
school and or undergraduate years.
The process of searching for and setting up dental shadowing experiences can be a daunting task. It can be more complicated than the actual shadowing
experience, which often overwhelms many predental students. Most challenges
occur when they are unaware of where to start, how to approach the dentist for
a shadowing request or they encounter other roadblocks.
Practitioner Sharda Patel, D.D.S. shares her best procedures for
requesting a job shadow in this article, along with an example to help get you
started.
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“So, you’ve
been accepted into a dental hygiene program or dental school—congratulations!
Taking the next step to further your education can be frightening, exciting and
rewarding all at once. But what’s next?” says Janet Franklin, RDH, M.P.A.,
Dental Hygiene Clinical Instructor at Concorde Career College-Kansas City.
“As a clinical
instructor at Concorde-Kansas City, I have been able to experience years of
teaching, guiding and assisting the future bright minds of the dental
profession—and I am here to share what I’ve learned with you. After seeing many
students move from a bundle of nerves on day one to confident, driven
graduates, there are some common strategies that the most career-ready have
used when walking their path toward success.”
Read on to
learn Prof. Franklin’s five tips to ensure your program experience goes as
smooth as possible and that you get out of it all that you can.
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The personal
statement is one of the most important parts of the ADEA AADSAS®
(ADEA Associated American Dental Schools Application Service) application. It
gives a dental school’s Admissions Committee the opportunity to assess your
motivations and decide if you will be extended an invitation to interview.
“Applicants
should use the personal statement as an opportunity to honestly reflect on
dentistry as a career choice,” says Larry G. Dunham, D.M.D., FACD, FICD, Assistant
Dean for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Belonging at Boston University
Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine.
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“Excitement is
in the air as you apply for allied dental health programs and envision yourself
as an oral health care provider,” says Jessica Kiser, Ed.D., M.S., RDH, Program
Director at Cape Fear Community College and Adjunct Clinical Lecturer,
University of Michigan School of Dentistry. “As you do your research, you may
talk with current or former students and realize these programs are challenging
yet so rewarding. These individuals may tell you about the program’s course
load and assessments, and you may start to wonder how to be successful. One way
to foster your success is to improve your study skills.”
A few
improvements could include creating a schedule, enhancing your reading skills
and reviewing course material before and after class.
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“The first time
I decided to pursue my dream to do a periodontics residency in the United States,
I approached the director of a periodontics program in one school who then
asked me to come for a six-month or one-year internship,” says National Boards
Educator Swati Gupta, M.D.S., B.D.S.
“Until that
moment, the only internship I was aware of, was the one-year mandatory
internship during the five-year completion of a Bachelor of Dental Medicine
(B.D.S.) in India,” Dr. Gupta said. After some research, she learned quickly
that internships and externships are recommended for any national or
international student who is keen to continue their career in dentistry in the
United States.
Keep reading to
learn the advice Dr. Gupta has for any international dentist considering
practicing their profession within the United States.
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As part of ADEA
GoDental’s ongoing focus on professional opportunities for dentists within the U.S.
Public Health Service (USPHS), we present
Capt. Nixon
Roberts, D.D.S., MPH, M.A., who shared his unique deployment
experience with Lt. Cmdr. Sayo Adunola, D.D.S., M.P.H., USPHS. Capt. Roberts served aboard the USNS
Comfort’s “Enduring Promise” mission in conjunction with the U.S. Navy. The
entire tour lasted about six months and included stops at several Central
American, South American and Caribbean countries with the mission of providing
free health care to the people of the region. ...
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“The personal statement
is one of the most important parts of the ADEA AADSAS® (ADEA
Associated American Dental School Application Service) application,” says Anirudha
Agnihotry, B.D.S., D.D.S. “It gives a dental school’s admissions committee the
opportunity to assess your motivations and decide if you will be extended an invitation
to interview. Often, it takes a long time to write it, and individuals may feel
lost on how to approach it. I will help guide you on the path to what I believe
is a successfully written and effective personal statement.”
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After serving in the United States Air Force, Jane Walsh, RDH, J.D., Program Director of Dental Hygiene at Louisiana State University Health New Orleans School of Dentistry (LSUSD), obtained her dental hygiene degree and then later her Juris Doctorate (J.D.). ...
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